Walter Jennings II, AKA Walt.

Almost a century ago, our grandfathers worked together to invent the battery-powered pacemaker, thus founding Diomedica. Today, the company has grown to be the largest medical device company in the world, specializing in the design and distribution of cranial and spine robotics, surgical tools, and insulin pumps. Diomedica employs over a hundred thousand people across the globe. It’s also the main reason I’m here today, willing to go through with this hasty marriage.

I’ve been around Walt a few times in my life at dinners and holiday parties, though it’s been almost a decade since I last saw him. He’s ten years my senior, which means even back then, I don’t think we had much to say to each other outside of obligatory greetings. Beyond thinking he was pretty hot for someone way older, he wasn’t on my radar, and I definitely wasn’t on his. I try to imagine what I would have looked like the last time we were together. There’s no doubt I was rail thin and lanky, probably trying and failing to fill out my dress. In all likelihood, I was off reading somewhere on my own, trying to disappear into a corner. I always brought a book with me to those parties my parents dragged me to.

I wonder what he would have been up to back then. Working the room? Flirting with women? My sister included?

We reach the door of the courthouse, and he reaches out to open it for me and usher me inside. I catch a hint of cologne as I brush past him, slightly embarrassed to think of what I must smell like in comparison. I didn’t bring much of a wardrobe with me to the city. This is my fanciest dress, and I was wearing it last night, which meant there was no time to get it dry-cleaned before this morning.

Walt is dressed much more appropriately than me in his camel coat and black suit. A leather watch is barely visible on his left wrist. His shined shoes click ominously against the tile floor, much more refined than my clunky boots.

I’m not sure where he’s leading me. In fact, I’m not sure how any of this is supposed to go. I peer at him from the corner of my eye to see his gaze laser-focused ahead, down the hall. We keep walking, then he stops to call an elevator, and I have to awkwardly pivot my momentum to carry me sideways instead of forward. He doesn’t seem to notice my wobble. In fact, I don’t think he even notices me.

I’d ask him questions—I have a million of them—but I suddenly feel like the cat’s got my tongue. I try to figure out why he seems to have stolen my voice as we step onto the elevator together, side by side. It’s the height, I tell myself. He’s got a good foot on me. Maybe more. The width of him doesn’t help either. He’s hefty, which I realize isn’t a wonderful way to describe a human as it lends itself to both trash bags and general wideness in any direction, but he is hefty. Strong and broad-shouldered.